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10A THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2015 Gearhart: Tax could bring city more than $176,000 per year Continued from Page 1A The city is budgeted to receive about $200,000 in lodging taxes from hotels and condominiums, based on a 7 percent per night lodging tax. Of the city’s 1,200 homes with water connections, more than 80 are used for short- term rentals. Thirty-¿ ve of those allow occupancy of 10 or more, he said, adding that those may be the same homes listed on different on- line sites. “We’re probably looking at about 82 homes,” Sweet said. Some companies charge a fee or collect a percentage of rental income. The number of visitors in each home varies. In some cases, homes with four bed- rooms house 17 people. “Some homes in Gearhart were designed that way,” Sweet said. Sweet estimated an av- erage short-term rental oc- cupancy rate of 25 percent during the summer season, or one night out of four, to- taling about 7,200 nights overall. At an average daily rate of between $300 and $350 a night, potential year- ly estimated revenue coming R.J. Marx/The Daily Astorian Susan Lorain, Daniel Jesse, Kerry Smith, Dianne Widdop and Paulina Cockrum discuss a potential vacation rental ordinance in Gearhart. in to Gearhart and the home- owners of Gearhart is $2.5 million. T he city does not regu- late or tax short-term rentals, Sweet said. If Gearhart adopted a tax Todd: She will celebrate ¿ ve years of sobriety in March Continued from Page 1A But after years of work- ing the À oor and tending the bar, the 55-year-old mother of Meat Bingo prefers to let her four staff members run the show. “At this stage of the game, my job is to be the owner,” said Todd, who lives in an apartment above the bar that began as a workers’ cafe in 1924. “I used to have to be in charge of everything. Now I’m just in charge of myself.” Though she and her late husband, Richard Todd, lost the lease in the mid-1990s, she bought it back a couple of years later and worked many an 18-hour day to restore its reputation. In her ¿ nal feat of labor as a one-woman show, Mary Todd was down on the men’s room À oor, scrubbing the linoleum tiles with Comet, while crying and wondering why she “owned this f----r again.” “Nobody’s worked that bar as hard as I have,” she said. “Never.” In too deep Todd is a familiar face in the local drug-and-alcohol rehabilitation community. On March 6, she will celebrate ¿ ve years of hard-earned so- briety. A functioning alcoholic since her teens, Todd became depressed and, in her words, “got weak when I empty-nest- ed” roughly seven years ago. “That’s when I couldn’t func- tion anymore.” “I’ve basically been a pret- ty strong person all my life,” she said. “And then I got in so deep that I couldn’t help my- self.” “I woke up one day. It was sh---y out. Cold. Typical Asto- ria winter weather. And I said, ‘I think I’m going to get drunk today,’” she recalled. “And I drank that ¿ rst year. (very day, functioned — and said, ‘I think I have a problem.’” That was y ear o ne. Year t wo, she said, “almost killed me.” Her kids tried to get her into dozens of treatment cen- ters. But, though she desper- ately wanted help, she didn’t have the right insurance and thousands of dollars for treat- ment. In the last three months of her two-year bender, Todd found herself falling down the stairs, shaking, drinking to settle down, vomiting, then drinking again. Finally, her father gave her the money to detox at Astoria Pointe and undergo rehab at T he Rose- bria r. “I was heading for my grave,” she said. “I couldn’t have continued to live like that for two more weeks. No- body could.” Recovery While Todd received treat- ment, her close friends kept the bar running. “The two years that I drank, I ran off a lot of peo- ple. But they’re all back now,” she said. “I wouldn’t make it without my regulars. God bless my regulars. Good folk.” Now she attends Alco- holics Anonymous meetings almost every day — some- times three meetings a day — throughout Astoria and Warrenton. “AA kind of wants to stay out of the spotlight, but, boy, it sure saved my life,” she said. “It works if you want it to work.” If recovering addicts stick together, their chances of overcoming their addition greatly increase, she said. “I’m big into helping other alcoholics, and if I can do it, they can do it,” she said. Before her recovery, there were two words Todd never used: grateful and serenity. Now those words are a big part of her vocabulary. For her upcoming Christ- mas gift to her four children — all of whom are college graduates , and most have families of their own — she hopes to ¿ nally quit smoking. On the day of this interview, Todd, who had smoked for 42 years, had gone 34 straight days without a cigarette. “Truly, I did not think I’d be able to do it,” she said, showing off the low-dose nic- otine patch on her arm. “I hav- en’t killed anybody. I’ve only gained about seven pounds.” DailyAstorian.com Polling the public The c ity m anager provid- ed options from “do nothing” to “full restrictions” if regu- lation should be considered. Councilors agreed to a data-gathering phase either conducted through an insert in water bills or a separate postcard. City Councilor Paulina Cockrum agreed establish- ing goals was the ¿ rst step. “We don’t want to go off in Johnson: State senator wants to make sure agencies are sticking to budgets approved by the Legislature Continued from Page 1A the project was on track, and Sen. Brian Boquist, R-Dal- las, in January asked a state of¿ cial to testify under oath on the exchange. Johnson wants the com- mittee to check whether agencies are sticking to bud- gets approved by the Legisla- ture and spending money for the purposes it was appropri- ated. “I don’t think that we do nearly as rigorous a job as we should in tracking where those dollars go and how they’re spent,” Johnson said. Follow up on state audits The committee could also follow up when agencies fail to implement suggestions by state auditors. For exam- ple, employees at the De- partment of Administrative Services, which houses the state data center, failed to ¿ x security problems at the data center despite repeated warnings by auditors dating back to 2006. “This committee on ac- countability would be in demanding agencies’ con- formance to management letters, if there were letters of improvement that were is- sued with an audit that called out de¿ ciencies at an agen- cy,” Johnson said. One aspect of the propos- al that could generate oppo- sition is Johnson’s preference to split membership 50-50 between Democrats and Re- publicans. Another sticking point could be the cost. Although Johnson has not proposed a speci¿ c budget for the com- mittee, she said, “I would give them access to lawyers, I would give them access to an audit function.” Fiscal of¿ ce short-staffed The Legislature already has nonpartisan staff law- yers, budget staff and econo- mists to forecast revenue and other impacts of legislation and policy. The Legislative Fiscal Of¿ ce, which works on bud- gets, is already short-staffed, Johnson said. “The fact of the matter is that I think there are too few people in legislative ¿ scal for the work that they’re doing, and the amount of complex- ity that now is out there in agency land,” Johnson said. “And by complexity, I mean information technology proj- ects.” In addition, Johnson would hand the committee decision-making authority over what state programs to audit, which would mean taking control away from the s ecretary of s tate. “I would let them, rath- er than a partisan secretary of state, make the decision about where and how audits would occur,” Johnson said. Molly Woon, a spokes- woman for the Secretary of State’s O f¿ ce, declined to comment. Johnson said her pro- posal was not intended as a criticism of the s ecretary of s tate’s audits staff, whom she described as “very capable professionals.” “But somebody is mak- ing a policy decision about where those audits ought to dig into,” Johnson said, and she believes lawmakers ought to make that call. Although legislative lead- ers could create an account- ability committee without legislation, it would last only as long as lawmakers sup- ported it. “I would like (the ac- countability committee) em- bedded in statute so it cannot be revoked at the whim of a presiding of¿ cer,” Johnson said. If the bill lacks momen- tum in the short session next year, Johnson said she will reintroduce it in 2017. The Capital Bureau is a collaboration between EO Media Group and Pamplin Media Group. W in a free $200 Gift Ca rd Sh a re yo u r o p in io n a b o u t Th e D a ily Asto ria n a n d D a ilyAsto ria n .co m a n d yo u ’ll a u to m a tica lly b e en tered in to a d ra w in g to receive a $200 VISA g ift ca rd T h e D a ily Astoria n is dedica ted to brin gin g you th e best in n ew s, en terta in m en t a n d a dvertisin g fea tures from a cross th e Colum bia -P a cific region . T h e w a y you get your n ew s a n d in form a tion is con sta n tly ch a n gin g so w e strive to sta y a h ea d of th ese ch a n ges. ‘I’m still here’ A lifelong Astoria resident whose mother hails from Ha- waii, Todd may own a suc- cessful business, but, the way she tells it, “I’m a terrible businesswoman. I run it with my heart. Always have. But, ya know, I’m still here for some reason.” Mary Todd’s Workers Bar & Grill regularly raises thou- sands of dollars for the Toys for Tots Foundation and of- fers free dinners on Thanks- giving and Christmas. Word of the bar — which staged a 25th anniversary luau in the beer garden during Labor Day w eekend — has spread to many outlying areas. People from Portland pass through and want to get their picture taken with the humble owner. “I’m proud of it after all these years,” she said. “I’ve been so pissed off and hated owning it. But, at this point, I’m proud of it.” — Erick Bengel Visit us online at on short-term rentals at the prevailing lodging rate of 7 percent, city revenue could exceed $176,000 per year. “I was conservative on all those numbers,” Sweet said. “Just to hedge our bets.” the wrong direction,” she said. “I’m totally open to the end point, but we need a da- ta-gathering phase to lay out what this is.” She proposed a work phase, voter referendum, implementation phase, mon- itoring and accountability. “There are a lot of steps we’ll have to work through, no matter what,” Cockrum said. Councilors established a timeline to develop a ques- tionnaire on short-term rentals, with a prototype to be delivered to Sweet and presented at the next City Council meeting Nov. 4. The survey would be sent to homeowners either as an in- sert in water bills, as a post- card or online. After the survey results are tallied, Sweet said, “You can make a decision — or not — at that point to move on.” “The longer we wait to do anything, the harder it will be to enact something,” Jesse said. Widdop said Gearhart is changing. “And in some ways it’s better, and in some ways it’s worse,” she said. “We need to keep this a won- derful place to live. There is no doubt: we need regula- tions.” To h elp us brin g you a n even better n ew spa per a n d w ebsite, w e’re con ductin g a sh ort rea der survey of our subscribers a n d n on subscribers. W e’re in vitin g you to be a pa rt of th a t survey. W e a p p recia te yo u ta k in g th e tim e to co m p lete th e qu estio n n a ire. As a th a n k yo u , a t th e en d o f th e su rvey, yo u ca n en ter a d ra w in g to w in a $200 VISA g ift ca rd . T h e con ta ct in form a tion you provide w ill on ly be used for th e dra w in g. W e w on ’t ren t or sell th is in form a tion to a n y outside en tity. T h e survey is bein g con ducted for resea rch purposes on ly. Y our in dividua l respon ses w ill be kept strictly con fiden tia l a n d n o solicita tion w ill occur due to your respon se. F ro m n o w u n til Octo b er 3 0, 2015 , yo u m a y a ccess th e su rvey o n lin e a t w w w.D a ilyAsto ria n .co m /d a /rea d ersu rvey.co m Th a n k yo u fo r h elp in g u s to m a k e th e D a ily Asto ria n a n d D a ilyAsto ria n .co m even m o re va lu a b le to th e co m m u n ities th a t we serve.
